To raise awareness of the plight of the endangered Egyptian vulture, WWF-Spain launched today a new project called El Viaje del Alimoche (The Journey of the Egyptian Vulture), which allows users to track the migratory journey of four of the rare birds through a real-time online platform.

The platform is available in Spanish at http://www.elviajedelalimoche.com, and allows the public to follow the birds in real time, upload and download videos and photos, and even comment in social media -- all as the vultures make their from Spain to the southern Sahara.

The four vultures –named Duna, Vega, Sahel and Trigo – have been marked with satellite transmitters, so WWF can now track their position as they travel in the air.

WWF decided to engage the public about the plight of the vultures after a bird being tracked during a trial stage of the satellite system was killed last year.

WWF discovered that several endangered birds, including a vulture wearing one of the satellite transmitters, had been deliberately poisoned when one of the devices showed no movement for several days. The vulture’s name was Atlas, and he was found dead among 13 other birds of prey.

The discovery allowed police to find and prosecute the person who had poisoned the birds. They were later charged with illegal use of poison and slaughter of endangered species.

To allow the public to monitor the tracking, WWF has launched the El Viaje del Alimoche website, where anyone can follow, in real time, the migratory journey of all four birds using an amazing 3D map and a broad range of video, audio and photo material.

To participate even more in the adventure, website visitors can upload their videos and photos and leave their comments and questions via Facebook, Twitter or the blog space provided.

The Egyptian Vulture is one of the most endangered birds of prey. The online tracking is only one of many other initiatives aimed at protect the species and eliminate threats, mainly power lines, wind farms , lack of prey and, the main one, poison.

In the last decade more than 1,000 Egyptian vultures have died in Spain.

With the support of Fundación Biodiversidad, WWF hopes to bring closer all different sectors of society who are directly and indirectly related to the survival of the species: hunters, farmers, scientific experts, institutions, teachers, media and general public.

wow... came back to this story after realising these are the vultures we saw in Kenya in Feb this year! We had no idea they were rare till we returned to camp and our driver and guide wanted us to show our photos to the other guides! Only now is it really sinking in how rare they are and what a lucky sighting we had!